ST. AUGUSTINE, Fla. – A toddler whose mother was killed in a West Augustine double shooting this year was adopted just in time for the holidays.
Jamie Wilson, 24, was shot and killed April 5 by 37-year-old Johnny Williams, who then backed his car over a stroller carrying their baby and drove to another street, where he opened fire on a group of people, killing 18-year-old Keiwuan Murray and wounding 28-year-old Brittany Tobler.
Williams pleaded guilty in July to 11 felony charges and was sentenced to seven concurrent life sentences without parole.
Wilson and Williams' son, Jamie, is now 10 months old and was officially adopted Dec. 13 by his maternal grandmother, Zemetra Carswell.
Carswell said the day she got full custody of baby Jamie was the first time she had a cathartic cry over her daughter's murder.
“I could not believe it that this was finally over,” she said. “And I was just on the floor crying just with such joy knowing that this was not all in vain.”
After Wilson's murder in April, baby Jamie went into foster care until June, but Wilson's mother said she knew she had to bring him home.
“Knowing that the more I dug in, the more I could continue forward, so his life could be beautiful. So that allowed me to find it within myself to continue to press forward,” Carswell said.
Carswell said she is slowly resuming her nursing career and that the training for that has helped guide her this far and will take them into the future.
“Ten years from now, oh my goodness! Well, I most certainly hope we have a lot of activities going on. Maybe we have some soccer,” Carswell said. “Then, of course, at dinner time, maybe we can just over dinner, we’ve gotten through the hard part of discussing about mom and dad.”
Carswell said she knows when Jamie gets older they’ll have to deal with whether or not he wants to see his father in prison.
But 20 years from now, when Jamie’s in college, Carswell said she dreams he’ll share his mother’s story, including her joy.
“I most certainly hope lunchtime will be happy for him, like any other student attending college, and not be burdened by this,” Carswell said.
Fortunately, if he attends a Florida school, Jamie’s college tuition has been taken care of by the state because he was adopted through the Department of Children and Families.